LIVERMORE, Calif. — Gil Herrera and Steve Rottler, two key members of Sandia National Laboratories’ senior leadership team, have been elected fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). The honor is bestowed upon AAAS members by their peers.
Herrera, director of Sandia’s Microsystems Science, Technology and Components Center and head of Sandia’s Microsystems and Engineering Sciences Applications (MESA) complex, was cited for “distinguished contributions to microelectronics for national security applications and professional service to the national security community.”
Herrera’s contributions extend beyond his work at Sandia. From 1997 to 1999, while on a leave of absence from Sandia, he served as the chief operating officer of SEMI/SEMATECH, an Austin-based consortium of U.S. suppliers of semiconductor manufacturing equipment and materials. From 1991 to 1992, on leave from Sandia, he was an AAAS/Sloan Foundation White House Science Fellow in the Office of Science and Technology Policy in President George H. W. Bush’s administration.
Herrera currently serves on advisory boards for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the University of Michigan, the University of New Mexico and the Council on Competitiveness. He is also a member of the Army Science Board, where he has led several studies and won the Commander’s Medal for Civilian Service and the Patriotic Civilian Service Award.
Rottler is vice president of Sandia’s California laboratory and serves as lead of the Laboratories’ Energy and Climate Program. AAAS recognized him for his “outstanding contributions through the leadership of science and engineering organizations in a national security laboratory.”
Prior to moving to Sandia/California, Rottler guided corporate research and development efforts as Sandia’s chief technology officer and vice president of science and technology. Before that he was chief engineer for nuclear weapons and vice president of weapon engineering and product realization. He has held other leadership roles within Sandia’s nuclear weapons mission with responsibilities for nuclear warhead system engineering and integration, the development of high-performance electronic systems, and system analyses and assessments. Early in his career at Sandia, Rottler conducted research in radiation hydrodynamics and managed computational fluid dynamics research.
Rottler is a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, a recipient of the Department of the Air Force Award for Exemplary Civilian Service and a fellow of Seminar XXI at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He serves or has served on the boards of directors of the United Kingdom Atomic Weapons Establishment, the New Mexico Humanities Council, the Albuquerque Explora Science Museum and Technology Ventures Corp.
This year 401 members were elected AAAS Fellows because of their scientifically or socially distinguished efforts to advance science or its applications. New fellows will be presented with a certificate and a gold-and-blue (representing science and engineering, respectively) rosette pin on Feb. 14 at the AAAS Fellows Forum during the 2015 AAAS Annual Meeting in San Jose, Calif.